With just a cursory glance at its tagline, you could easily surmise that Limitless isn’t going to be a “good” movie: “What if a pill could make you rich and powerful?” This sounds like the stuff of mediocre sci-fi fare, and it is.
Eddie (The Hangover pretty boy Bradley Cooper) is a writer who has secured a book deal but hasn’t written a word in months. His girlfriend (Abbie Cornish), tired of waiting for Ed to get himself together, dumps him after she lands a lucrative job as an editor at a big New York City magazine. (Two writers earning a living wage in New York City: Now that’s science fiction.) Eddie ends up in possession of a little pill that unlocks the user’s full mental potential, allowing him to crank out his novel in a matter of days and rapidly work his way up the ranks in Wall Street. Of course, the pill comes with some undesirable side effects and Eddie’s skyrocket to fame draws some unwanted attention from some bad dudes.
Limitless director Neil Burger (unfortunately of no relation to sweaty oddball comedian Neil Hamburger) also directed The Illusionist, but where Burger’s period piece was slow and soft, Limitless is brisk and punctuated with visual parlor tricks (e.g., nauseating infinite zooms down New York streets, numbers raining from the ceiling, upside down shots and colors that heat to a high-contrast when characters pop pills and slur back to a slummy gray as reality returns).
Things get messy with some silly moments, awful and unnecessary narration and poorly fleshed out characters—we’re never shown why we should give a damn about Eddie, who uses the brain-enhancing drug for his own selfish gain and may actually be a murderer. But, despite the generic “techno thriller” plot and characters, Limitless doesn’t completely tank thanks to the impossible likability of Cooper, who I so desperately want to despise but cannot.
Limitless never feels dull, but it also never delivers any truly thrilling moments. In the end, it proves to be a cautionary tale that cautions nothing and offers little to warrant praise or outright condemnation.
--Eric Pulsifer
Eddie (The Hangover pretty boy Bradley Cooper) is a writer who has secured a book deal but hasn’t written a word in months. His girlfriend (Abbie Cornish), tired of waiting for Ed to get himself together, dumps him after she lands a lucrative job as an editor at a big New York City magazine. (Two writers earning a living wage in New York City: Now that’s science fiction.) Eddie ends up in possession of a little pill that unlocks the user’s full mental potential, allowing him to crank out his novel in a matter of days and rapidly work his way up the ranks in Wall Street. Of course, the pill comes with some undesirable side effects and Eddie’s skyrocket to fame draws some unwanted attention from some bad dudes.
Limitless director Neil Burger (unfortunately of no relation to sweaty oddball comedian Neil Hamburger) also directed The Illusionist, but where Burger’s period piece was slow and soft, Limitless is brisk and punctuated with visual parlor tricks (e.g., nauseating infinite zooms down New York streets, numbers raining from the ceiling, upside down shots and colors that heat to a high-contrast when characters pop pills and slur back to a slummy gray as reality returns).
Things get messy with some silly moments, awful and unnecessary narration and poorly fleshed out characters—we’re never shown why we should give a damn about Eddie, who uses the brain-enhancing drug for his own selfish gain and may actually be a murderer. But, despite the generic “techno thriller” plot and characters, Limitless doesn’t completely tank thanks to the impossible likability of Cooper, who I so desperately want to despise but cannot.
Limitless never feels dull, but it also never delivers any truly thrilling moments. In the end, it proves to be a cautionary tale that cautions nothing and offers little to warrant praise or outright condemnation.
--Eric Pulsifer
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